s. The
Portuguese advised me not to take any observation, as the instruments
might awaken fears in Bonga's mind, but Manoel said I might do so if I
wished; his garden, however, being above the confluence, could not avail
as a geographical point. There are some good houses in the stockade. The
trees of which it is composed seemed to me to be living, and could not
be burned. It was strange to see a stockade menacing the whole commerce
of the river in a situation where the guns of a vessel would have
full play on it, but it is a formidable affair for those who have only
muskets. On one occasion, when Nyaude was attacked by Kisaka, they
fought for weeks; and though Nyaude was reduced to cutting up his copper
anklets for balls, his enemies were not able to enter the stockade.

On the 24th we sailed only about three hours, as we had done the day
before; but having come to a small island at the western entrance of the
gorge of Lupata, where Dr. Lacerda is said to have taken an astronomical
observation, and called it the island of Mozambique, because it was
believed to be in the same latitude, or 15d 1', I wished to verify
his position, and remained over night: my informants must have been
mistaken, for I found the island of Mozambique here to be lat. 16d 34'
46" S.

Respecting this range, to which the gorge has given a name, some
Portuguese writers have stated it to be so high that snow lies on it
during the whole year, and that it is composed of marble. It is not
so high in appearance as the Campsie Hills when seen from the Vale of
Clyde. The western side is the most abrupt, and gives the idea of the
greatest height, as it rises up perpendicularly from the water six or
seven hundred feet. As seen from this island, it is certainly no higher
than Arthur's Seat appears from Prince's Street, Edinburgh. The rock
is compact silicious schist of a slightly reddish color, and in thin
strata; the island on which we slept looks as if torn off from the
opposite side of the gorge, for the strata are twisted and torn in every
direction. The eastern side of the range is much more sloping than the
western, covered with trees, and does not give the idea of altitude
so much as the western. It extends a considerable way into the Maganja
country in the north, and then bends round toward the river again, and
ends in the lofty mountain Morumbala, opposite Senna. On the other
or southern side it is straighter, but is said to end in Gorongozo, a
m